photo credit: 123 look at me

Updated original post with scores and notes on the Red River Belgians (See Beers)

Some of the BeerViking ( mostly Doc D but Hunter as well) crew are heading to Northern California on a serious pillage mission.

They will be filing field reports via Twitter and at HQ we’ll try to pull these together into semi-coherent summaries.

First up, some hippy music with the Grateful Dead. Key lines here are:

California, I’ll be knocking on the golden door

Which when it comes to craft beer, most people have to agree that California is exactly that.

Breweries/Pubs

Stop 1:  Beach Chalet

17 @pubrank for the Beach Chalet in San Francisco, CA. http://www.beachchalet.com/

Stop 2:  Marin Brewing Company

http://twitpic.com/aq8xo – NorCal Micro Brewery Raid – stop No 2: Marin BrewCo, Larkspur. Tasty!

Stop 3:  Russian River

http://twitpic.com/aq998 – Russian River – beer menu. So many and so good. Like ‘wine; and fine women.

View Nor Cal in a larger map

The Beers

All of these have been brewranked, here’s a Search on Twitter where you can find more details.

The Belgian Style Brews @ Russian River

Doc D filed the following update into HQ.

• Perdition – Biere de Sanoma: very lgith, sublte hints of dry white
  wine, good summer or session beer. 12
• Damnation – Strong Golden Ale: Fuck amazing want more. 17
• Salvation – Dark Strong Ale: fine for winter wrong time of year. Not
  going to finish it. 14
• Temptation: this reminds me of Orval but even more refined. Super
  graphfruity notes. 15
• Sanctification – 100% Brettanomyces, 6.25%ABV: ‘lambic’ style to my
  taste. Really smooth. 17
• Consercration – dark sour aged in oak barrels. 10% abv: ouch can’t
  rate too complex. like a whisky.
• Publication – Saison 8% abv best of the belgians in this line up today. 18!

Summary

By hitting Russian River and knocking back Pliney the Elder, arguably the prototype American Pale Ale, the guys have started the raid with impeccable standards.  As I’m living a vicarious dream from HQ, I for one can’t wait to see what the next couple of days holds.

Brewery Name Beer Name, ABV, Rank, Notes (if any):

• Ballards Midhurst Mild, 3.4%, 10
• Ballards Nyewood Gold, 5.0%, 15
• Ballards Wassall, 6%, no rank just  a star *
• Dark Star American Pale Ale, 4.7%, 13-15, couldn’t agree
• Downtown Elderquad, 4%, 13
• Downtown IPA, 6.8%, no rank just a star *
• Exmoor Gold, 4.5%, ?
• Harviestoun Top Dollar, 4%, 14
• Hop Back Summer Lightning, 5%, 14, love this one a classic we had many times before
• Sarah Hughes Dark Ruby, 6%, 17, beer of the festival!
• Shepherd Neame Ghost, 4.1%, 14, brewed for the fest
• Titanic, White Star, 4.8%, 15, a Belgian-esque golden ale
• Traditional Scottish Ales Ben Nevis, 4%, 10, needed have this next to fire after a long walk and with some red meat
• Twickenham Fine Ales Naked Ladies, 4.4%, 15.5
• Twickenham Fine Ales Sundancer, 3.7%, 15, sweet session brew
• Twickenham Fine Ales Spring Ale, 4.3%, 15.5
• Wolf Granny Wouldn’t Like It, 4.8%

That’s 17 real ales. Wow that was a lot of brew for the crew.

I will come back later to add more details but wanted to capture initial thoughts:

If this is the plan these guys have for pubs, sign me up as a licensee.

Great to see six casks on pull, all local from Sussex

• Dark Star Hophead
• Dark Star American Pale Ale
• 1648 Winter Warrent
• 1648 Signature
• Harveys Old
• Haveys Best

How many pub loo’s do you know with marble and fittings from Crapper. Actually how many pub loo’s do you know where you want to take a crap.

This isn’t a boozer, a bit sanitised but I know my wife would come here ( a good thing) – now if only they get some country one’s with awesome children’s playgrounds.

The beer is served in tankards – Cool!

The beer is actually a bit warm.  And by that, don’t worry. I might be from Canada but appreciate my beer at cellar temperature but I reckon we’re pushing 15C here.

The interior is a bit odd.  On one hand big brass look, with lots of wood (nothing wrong there) but why the wallpaper that has faux bricks peeking through.

The barkeep couldn’t tell me where 1648 was from.

Surprisingly small collection of bottles (ok, maybe I’ve been spoiled by the White Horse, Rake and Evening Star) but I would have expected some more.

What, a fake fire.

Forthright and free with letting one try samples.

Very yummy food.

End result on first glance. Would visit again and look forward to the development of the concept but there’s a lot of room for improvement. Still, love the tankards and local focus.

I’m taking a tasting publishing hiatus at the moment but still had post about this.

Amazing news to report.

One of BeerViking’s firm favourite brewers, Dark Star Brewing Co., have confirmed they are brewing their award winning American Pale Ale all the time now and not just seasonally.

Here’s what Dark Star says about the American Pale Ale:

4.7% American Pale Ale
(March – May)
The yeast strain used for the brewing of the pale, dry, American Ales was specially imported from the USA, along with some Chinook and Centennial hops, to produce this pale ale. The low colour Maris Otter malt provides a perfect light colour and dryness to balance the crisp taste and full aroma of the hops.

At writing:

Beeradvocate,  there’s been 6 reviews with a rating of an A and an ave. of 4.38.

ratebeer, 44 reviews, ave. rating is 3.65/5, 97 percentile in it’s glass and 91 overall.

For us hop heads in the UK, this is certainly a great start to 09 and I would say lays down the challenge to the other UK brewers to come up something competitive.

Now if only Dark Star will bottle this then we’re really onto something.